Michigan State Rep. John Kivela (D-Marquette) was found dead Tuesday in Lansing of an apparent suicide. The discovery comes one day after Kivela was arrested for the second time on a drunk driving charge.

What are the signs of someone thinking about committing suicide and how can we prevent it? Current State’s Brooke Allen talks with a local woman about her struggle with depression and the area director from the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.

In October, California became the fifth state to pass a death with dignity law, allowing for terminally ill people to obtain physician assisted suicides. The right to die movement, though, got its start much closer to home. It’s most visible and controversial advocate, Jack Kevorkian, went to the University of Michigan’s medical school and performed over 100 physician assisted suicides in the state. We talk to Mike Morganroth, an attorney and long time friend of Jack Kevorkian about his legacy and the impact he had on today’s debate over right to die legislation.

Many of the people arrested in the United States suffer from a mental illness, and research indicates that those released from custody are four times as likely to attempt suicide when compared with those in jail. We talk with Dr. Jennifer Johnson about her research aimed at lowering the post-detention suicide rate.

In Michigan, there are 191 areas designated as having a mental health care health professional shortage. Only and Texas and California have higher numbers of shortages, and that has devastating consequences. New research from the Child Health Institute found that young people in rural areas are twice as likely to commit suicide than their urban peers. In two northern Michigan counties, state and local officials are trying to hard to improve mental health care access for its rural residents.

An MSU researcher is part of a team that’s been looking at a possible link between Vitamin D deficiency and suicide attempts. The research was published this fall in the journal “Psychoneuroendocrinology.”

Experts in suicide prevention tend to focus their outreach efforts on two segments of the population: young adults and the elderly. But shifting data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have some professionals reconsidering that approach.

Last month, statistics showed a 60% increase in suicide among women in their early 60’s and a 50% spike among men in their 50’s. The data covers the calendar year 2010.